Tip Tuesday - Flowers

Yesterday we shared some floral inspiration. Today we have some tips for making your own easy and lovely flowers to use on scrapbooking layouts, cards and paper crafts.

Before you start, gather up some pretty scraps. You don't need a lot of paper to create these gorgeous blooms! Other tools you may have that would come in handy are circle punches or a cutting system, a scalloped circle punch, a heart punch, scissors, paper adhesive and various circular embellishments.

1) Layer it.

Use a set of graduated circle punches or cutters to cut 3 or 4 circles of different sizes from a variety of scrap papers. Layer them from largest to smallest, adhering each layer onto the next. Finish your layered circle flower with a brad, button, doodle, sticker rub-on etc.

2) You gotta have heart.

Use a heart punch (any size) to cut out 4 hearts from scrap paper. Place them with their points together and slightly overlapping. Adhere together. Cover the spot where the hearts join with a circle punched from a coordinating or contrasting piece of scrap paper. (Or use a brad, button or sticker as mentioned above.)

3) Shapely scallops.

Transform a scalloped circle into a 3-D flower with some scoring and bending. First find and mark the centre of the circle. Then using a ruler and a stylus (or bone folder), score from the peak of each scallop to the centre mark. Then, score from the low point of each scallop to the centre mark. Gently accordian fold back and forth, pushing the lines that go from the peaks to the centre upwards, and the other scored lines downwards. Finish off the centre with your choice of circular embellishment.

4) More than paper.

Try cutting flower shapes from felt, fabric, vellum, or even an office transparency for a unique look. (The vellum and office transparency shown below were cut with a Cricut machine and the felt flower was simply hand cut with scissors.)

5) Snip it.

A super easy flower can be made by taking a circle and snipping "V" shapes from the outside towards the centre. Layer another snipped circle on top if you like. Once again, finish the flower with a little something in the centre.

Bonus tip: For easy stems and leaves as shown in the first photo above: Cut a strip-stem for the blooms to sit on from a textured or slightly patterned green paper scrap, or use a piece of rick rack or ribbon. Leaves can be made with your circle punch - punch a circle then slip it back into the punch only partway until you see a football/oval shape. Punch again. Score and fold slightly down the middle if you like a 3-D look.

If you try any of these tips we'd love to see them. Email us a photo or a link to your blog. Enjoy making and using flowers on your projects this week!

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